


the tender press

by Zsazsa4



Category: The Terror (TV 2018)
Genre: Anal Sex, Class Differences, M/M, and how!, just two men utterly lost in the cloud of unknowing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-21
Updated: 2020-06-21
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:55:27
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,762
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24843418
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zsazsa4/pseuds/Zsazsa4
Summary: The night Tozer tapped cautiously at his door, he had been drinking, somehow. He carried it well but Edward could tell from the careful way he held himself, the concentration with which he strung his words together.‘Let me in, won’t you, lieutenant,’ Tozer said, standing so close that Little could smell the sweetish, astringent colour to his breath. No question what he wanted, what he was certain Edward would give him.(Lt. Little receives an unexpected guest.)
Relationships: Lt Edward Little/Sgt Solomon Tozer
Comments: 7
Kudos: 49





	the tender press

The night Tozer tapped cautiously at his door, he had been drinking. He carried it well but Edward could tell from the careful way he held himself, the concentration with which he strung his words together. ‘What on earth is the matter?’ he asked, then winced at the frantic edge which worked its way into his voice. A poor beginning.

‘Let me in, won’t you, lieutenant,’ Tozer said, standing so close that Little could smell the sweetish, astringent colour to his breath. God knew how he’d got into the stores, which steward he’d charmed, cozened or bullied. It wasn't a question, really. Tozer seemed utterly assured; he might be drunk but he stood there fully in possession of himself, chest out, leaning loose in the doorway. No question what he wanted, what he was certain Edward would give him. 

It was not the thing to do, not at all. He should have - what? Dressed Tozer down, put him on a charge? The idea exhausted him. He would have to explain what had happened, he would have to be party to questioning, to explanation, to punishment. It was easier simply to shut the door behind them. It was easier to say that was the reason he allowed Tozer in.

‘You have some explaining to do, sergeant.’

Tozer said nothing, only stood up laughably, drunkenly straight and looked around him. His face was flushed, ruddier than usual. Finally, he said, ‘It’s you made a pass at me. It's you asked for it.’

This was not untrue; but Little had never thought about it in those words before and had done his best to forget it. He had simply assumed that Tozer had not understood, that the double meaning was too far out of the bounds of his perception. Disappointed, relieved, he had tried not to think about it since, and besides it had been an accident on his own part. Inopportune phrasing. ‘Gin, is it?’ he said helplessly.

Tozer leaned in closer towards him, so that the bed pushed uncomfortably into the back of Little’s legs. ‘I thought on, sir. How long you'd wait for it. What I miss the most, and that’s a good drink, in my own time, just for the pleasure of it, and a good tumble.’

‘The drink first?’ He was enveloped by regret and embarrassment in an instant. It had seemed clever, before he’d said it.

‘No fear, sir. I’d have to have a fair bit more than that.’ Tozer flashed him a peculiar grin, half grimace, almost a baring of teeth. He wasn’t very much taller than Edward but he was bigger and broader by far, with a ruddy face that made him look frank and open. It had never occurred to Little that the man might be devious, really that he might think at all. His drunkenness had exposed him, where Little would not have thought there was anything to expose.

Better to have it over with, then. He did desire Tozer after all, less so than he did some but more than most, and it had been idiotic to expect anything other than this. At least they weren’t in the hold. He turned around, leant over the bed, dropped his long underwear.

Tozer patted his arse. ‘Can tell you’re used to paying for it,’ he said. ‘Expect it all to be done for you.’

Little bristled, because the comment was not completely untrue and because Tozer would not be directed without receiving orders, did not have the grace or knowledge to do it how it was done. That was the price you paid; along with your quid. ‘And what would you know about that?’

‘As there’s nothing to spend it on out here, and you can't buy me a drink,’ Tozer continued, ‘let us have a kiss instead.’

He straightened up and turned around. Tozer’s lips were chapped almost to the point of bleeding, but his mouth was warm and tasted sharp and bitter with gin. The kiss was awkward and Little had never really liked kissing men, but at the same time it was quite nice. His face went hot as Tozer licked into his mouth, put his hands under his jumper that he sometimes wore abashedly to bed, all over his chest and shoulders. Gripped him firm and coarse, squeezed at his chest then his arse. He was wholly unused to being touched, felt up, like that - to be desired like this unsettled him. He brought his hands up, wooden, but he couldn’t leave them at his sides forever. He dug his fingers into Tozer’s shoulders until Tozer pulled away and wiped his own mouth. A good thing his complexion didn’t colour but Tozer was pinker than ever. ‘I should like to see you properly, if that’s how we’re doing it,’ Little said. He began to unbutton Tozer’s jacket.

Tozer looked at Edward coolly, appraising. ‘The stripes put you off? You do seem the type. Imagine I'm a private, sir.’ It made him uncomfortable to think of himself as another in a line of tricks, sized up so easily; his enthusiasm, such as it was, began to wane. Then Tozer squeezed his prick through his trousers, and said, ‘Not to worry, sir; tell us what you want and I shall do it.’ That was efficacious although patently insincere. Tozer took the jacket off entirely, and that was even better; if you ignored the cut of the trousers he could be a navvy in his coarse shirt and braces. ‘Too old and too grubby, eh?’ he said. ‘We all have to make do.’

‘No,’ Little said, meaning it. ‘Not at all.’

Tozer put him on the bed on his hands and knees, knelt over him. He was not callous or brutal, but neither was he solicitous of Edward’s comfort and pleasure. He went nowhere near Little’s prick once it was freed from his underwear, leaving him to fumble for it himself, but prepared him dutifully, dipping his fingers into the lamp’s reservoir of whale oil. Once seated inside - he was thick, substantial, and he pushed in slow but firm - he was thankfully no longer so dispassionate, pressing into him almost exactly right, grunting against his neck. A touch more brutality might have been pleasurable, because then they would not have been conducting the act at arm’s length, as it were. It was not an act during which Little could ever maintain detachment; every time it overwhelmed him, so that he felt hot inside. So that he was entirely made up of inside, with no skin to keep the world off. He wanted to drop his face into the pillow but Tozer held him up with an arm around his chest. He breathed sharply through his nose; he ought to have been terrified that they'd be caught, but that small scared part of him seemed very far away. It went on, seeming to stretch out infinitely, this unmaking.

‘Christ,’ Tozer panted. ‘That’s grand. That’s grand,’ and pulled out as he spent, just catching Edward but in the main spilling over Edward’s thighs. His arsehole clenched at the sudden emptiness, and Tozer held the back of his neck gently as he made a weak choked-off noise. ‘Nay, my honey, no need for that,’ he said, and pushed a finger back inside, hard, at the right moment.

‘Dear God, I needed that,’ Little couldn’t stop himself saying. He felt almost drunk himself, that he could not control himself. ‘I needed that.’ 

Tozer just looked at him, inscrutable, then said, 'Your lot always do.'

Afterwards they lay down next to each other, on their sides, trousers around knees and ankles and boots still on. Little would not quite let Tozer hold him as he so obviously wanted to; it would have been unbearable. ‘You did that - often? Before? Or now?’ Little asked, hesitant.

‘Not for a while, even before all this,’ Tozer said. ‘But you wouldn’t be interested in none of that.’

He was, mildly and pruriently, but not enough to press. He liked to hear Tozer’s voice, but didn’t very much want to listen to him, to be called on to respond, to understand or worse. He wished Tozer had spoken more during the act; it was his accent, the voice like a grindstone, that had first caught him, a voice that guaranteed a certain remoteness. They spoke different languages; were practically of a different species. He wasn’t particularly interested in Tozer now, beyond the fact of him in his bed and the feel of his body. He imagined that Tozer’s life would appear, in the main, incomprehensible to him and sordid where it wasn’t. It occurred to him how he would fit into it when, if, Tozer found someone who sincerely wanted to hear. Unlikely, even if they were to make it home, thank God. He could think of a number of ways Tozer could tell it, each worse than the last. Unless, of course, he would not feature at all.

‘But you never did it out of necessity,’ Little said, because he needed it to be so. 

‘Just a few drinks or a bit of pin money. By the time I knew how to do it I wouldn't have starved without it,’ Tozer said, perhaps trying to be comforting. An awkward pause, then, as they had just gone onto three quarter rations. ‘Stop harping on it.’ Little couldn’t have said whether or not he was lying. Tozer gave up on trying to get Edward in his arms, wiped his prick with the bedsheets, got up and pulled up his trousers and braces. ‘I ought to be going before I’m missed,’ he said. ‘But it weren't half bad, that. Not for a cold fish.’

He was gone before Little could say any of the things that occurred to him. Don’t leave, stay another minute; how dare you, get out and don’t presume any more; please, come back again. Tozer had done it - because he wanted a woman, presumably. Because he was drunk. Because he had conjectured that Little was the easiest cowed into either giving in or keeping silent. It would be for the best if Tozer never came back, and he could forget everything he’d half-learnt about him. He considered asking one of the other lieutenants if they thought that Sergeant Tozer was something too deep; was cracked, perhaps. But they would dismiss the idea as ridiculous, and so should he. It would be useless to speculate as to what Tozer might think of them; but he knew now that think of them he probably did.


End file.
